


The Logistics of Victory

by cupiscent



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-06-20
Updated: 2008-06-20
Packaged: 2017-10-07 20:34:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/68993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cupiscent/pseuds/cupiscent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter's going to do something rather reckless that his sister absolutely wouldn't approve of. As per usual, after a battle. He doesn't mind if Caspian tags along.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Logistics of Victory

**Author's Note:**

> "What I don't understand," I said to [](http://queeniegalore.livejournal.com/profile)[**queeniegalore**](http://queeniegalore.livejournal.com/), "is why there isn't a whole _slew_ of post-battle extra-energy-purging slash fic." (If there's more out there, GIMME! *G*) Thanks to Bedlam for the intercontinental beta.

They crowned Caspian that afternoon on the riverbank (somewhat makeshift, but good enough for the interim) in front of as many of the Telmarines as could still stand. Peter may have done the honours, but Aslan conducted the ceremony, and yes, they _were_ making a point, and a fast one, and he was pretty sure the majority of the soldiers got it. They went quietly afterwards, in any case.

So then it was all over. The fighting definitely was, at least, and that seemed to be, as usual, where Peter's ultimate authority ended. The council of war merged effortlessly into a council of housekeeping, Susan and Edmund and the quartermasters of the two armies, and Glozelle's second-in-command (the Telmarines showing remarkable composure in the face of having a meeting with a badger). Peter was frankly surprised it took as long as it did for Su to shove him bodily out of the tent; the sun had gone down in the meantime and the stars danced merrily overhead, and the carouse down below at the water's edge was in full swing.

The tentflap fell behind him on Edmund's voice ("-- no use bemoaning the state of Telmarine cobbling if --") and Peter stuck his hands in his pockets, surveying the camp and quashing the urge to whistle. The sound of pipes and laughter drifted up from the party below, figures gambolling around the heaped and burning remains of Miraz's bridge. Lucy would be down there, of course. At this part of the business she far outstripped her siblings.

Going down to join her wasn't quite the last thing Peter wanted, but he knew from experience that it wouldn't help. Wouldn't ease the clangour in his veins, wouldn't stop the twitch of his muscles (even now, his calves flexing, his fingers tapping inside his pockets), wouldn't drain away the alertness that drew the night in sharp-etched lines around him.

The softest of treads to his left had Peter whirling, a hand to the knife at his belt; the shadowed figure raised its palms in the moonlight. "Easy, your majesty," Caspian said, stepping forward. "You've won already."

"_We've_ won already," Peter corrected, excess energy cracking his smile into a grin.

Caspian grinned in return, stepping closer, and Peter thought of a way to spend the evening, one that had always worked in the past. Thought of it and shoved it aside in the same moment. Far too many complications.

But he recognised the shift of Caspian's weight, the toss of his head, and when the new-made king looked towards the tent, Peter said, "I wouldn't, if I were you." In response to a curious glance, he added, "Bogged down in the logistics of victory. Stocktaking, provision of prisoners, travel plans, supply trains. They'll be at it all night, trust me. Susan's already kicked me out."

At the mention of her name, Caspian glanced again towards the tent; Peter suppressed a snigger and wondered if Caspian knew just how transparent he was. But some men didn't care, and usually Peter couldn't cast stones on that one. He waited, as still and patient as he could manage this evening, until Caspian looked back and asked, "What will you do now?"

Peter shrugged and felt himself grinning, with not the slightest inclination to prevent it. "Haven't any idea, actually. But history suggests something rather reckless that my sister would absolutely not approve of."

Caspian hesitated, glancing back towards the tent again, but his fingers were tapping against the hilt of his belt knife, and Peter knew he had the right of it.

"Would company be welcome?" Caspian asked.

*

Extricating themselves from the camp _without_ acquiring a skin of wine would have been easier, but they managed it eventually, running unevenly on the river rocks past a sentry who shouted after them with laughter in his voice. Peter slowed to let Caspian catch him up, and to try the spoils of larceny, surprised to find it was an excellent drop, full to bursting with the memories of golden summer days and ripe with a taste that took him back to Cair Paravel. Caspian jostled his shoulder, taking the skin from Peter's suddenly loose grip, and he was two strides further on before he noticed and turned quizzically back.

Peter shook his head, crossing the distance and nudging Caspian into motion again, water-rounded stones turning under their boots as they trudged on. The noise of the camp faded slowly behind them as they went upriver, merriment carrying far on balmy Narnian air. Caspian tossed the wineskin back, and Peter kept tight rein on his memories as he tilted his head back for another swig. The wine was strong enough without world-hopping vertigo on top. Lowering the skin again, he wiped at his chin with the back of his hand, jerking the same hand up to fend Caspian off as the other slipped sideways on the unsteady footing. Shoved him away and laughed; was still laughing when Caspian came lurching back to barge against his shoulder. In another world, Peter would be (had been) gritting his teeth and hauling off, ready to let fly, but here and now he was chuckling out loud, stumbling sideways and jogging two steps with the force of it only to pause and turn back.

Caspian was standing still on the riverbank, moonlight bathing him and limning the rocks around his feet. When Peter held the wineskin out to him, he took it, but did not lift it. "What is it?" Peter asked, taking a step back towards him.

A shake of his head, but the look on Caspian's face was more lost than denying. "I feel..." he trailed off, reaching until he found, "overfull. Too much inside my skin." He was observant, if nothing else, this Telmarine king; eyes on Peter's face, he asked: "Is it always like this?"

Peter shrugged. "Always is for me." Downriver, he could still see the glow of bonfires over the dark treeline between. "I don't think it bothers Ed, he just never sleeps the night before a battle. But Susan gets it even worse than me." Caspian looked skeptical, and Peter laughed. "Just be grateful for the logistics, or we'd all be being organised, tidied and fussed over to within an inch of our lives right now." Caspian chuckled, looking down with his hair falling in his face, and Peter added, "Are you going to drink that or just hold it all night?"

They continued upstream, putting another bend between themselves and the distant sounds of revelry as the skin grew slack between them. The river grew wider and gentler, though it was in general still tame in the wake of the spirit's passing. Peter gathered flat stones and skipped them upon the water - well, tried, at least. Not a skill he'd ever taken the time to perfect. Caspian stood higher on the shore, staring across at the forest on the other side.

"I've swum this river once before," he said suddenly. Peter turned to look up at him, but his eyes were shadowed. "The night I escaped. That was when I first realised I was--"

"Out of your depth?" Peter suggested, but was adding, "Sorry," even before Caspian's sharp glare swung down upon him. "Sorry," he repeated, "I didn't..." He looked over his shoulder at the river, distracted by an idea, and already tugging at the buckle of his swordbelt as he turned back to Caspian. "Fancy swimming it again?"

"Are you insane?" Caspian asked, but there was an edge in his voice - of fascination, of wild laughter, of thrill - that Peter recognised as though it had come from within himself.

"Rather reckless," Peter repeated with emphasis, as he tugged his shirt free at his waist, reached for his own collar to pull the linen over his head and off. Caspian was still staring at him. "Well," Peter said with a burgeoning grin, "if you're scared..."

Caspian threw the skin at him, and Peter caught it, laughing as he dropped his shirt. There was barely any wine at all left inside, a few mouthfuls sloshing around at the bottom, and Peter had to stretch it out, tilting his head right back. A few drops shook free, running down his neck, and Peter honestly did not care. He dropped it, empty, on the pebbled riverbank, beside his shirt and Caspian's, their boots. Peter glanced over Caspian's torso - marked with the first wounds that wouldn't even cause scars, barely anything at all, nicks and cuts from chainmail under stress - and Caspian stared out over the river again.

"This is insane," Caspian said, his grin shivering with anticipation.

"See the tree? The big pine closest to the water?" Peter pointed, downriver a way, and waited until Caspian nodded. "Last one to it walks to the capital."

They locked eyes for only a moment before they were both sprinting for the water. They thundered in, floundering and lurching and sending up walls of spray. Peter dove first, heard Caspian breaking the water like an echo. The water was cool but not cold, rimed with moonlight and tugging against his hair and trousers. He swam underwater until the river bottom fell away beneath him, until the water started to run faster and his lungs were bursting - _too much inside my skin_. Surfacing, he took a huge, joyous, _alive_ breath, and struck out for the far shore, swimming in earnest. Nothing but the river and the moon and the movement of arms and legs, and the splashes beside him that were none of these. The rest of the world began to fracture and fall away, leaving just himself, here and now.

Which was all Peter had been trying to find.

His arms were burning, his breath starting to labour, when he felt his fingertips brushed the bottom. He pushed harder, a few final strokes before he could get his feet under him, lumbering up out of the water. Something - _someone_ \- caught at his ankle and he stumbled, almost went down onto one knee; yelped and drove an elbow into Caspian's side. They staggered up the riverbank, panting and neck and neck. Peter didn't even know if it was the same tree he had pointed out from the other side, but their palms hit it in unison, thudding into the bark.

Caspian half collapsed against the tree, turning his shoulder against it and bracing his feet against the earth as he laughed as well as he could with his breath stolen by the river. "Thank you," he managed. His hair dripped in his face, and he shook it back, eyes aglow and grin wide. "That was..." He shook his head, laughing again.

And Peter, leaning over him with his hand braced on the treetrunk as he took deep breaths, damned all the complications. He stepped forward and kissed Caspian - water, breath, warmth - for the moment it took for Caspian's hand to land on his shoulder and push.

Peter went, taking two steps back and trying to tell himself he had not just made a terrific blunder. Trying not to think of the way Susan's mouth would thin and her eyes roll, of the wincing look Ed would give him before he began to outline all the ways in which the High King had mucked up, and what they could do about it. He looked up, at Caspian's face slack with surprise and his eyes...

Peter met his eyes, and Caspian stepped forward, his hand at the back of Peter's neck and his mouth on Peter's and his eyes closed. His breath lost anew, Peter kissed back, his palms slipping on the wet skin of Caspian's shoulders. Smeared his fingers down Caspian's spine as Caspian's in turn tugged at the short hair at the nape of Peter's neck. Peter nudged, edging Caspian backwards, coaxing his mouth open, until the kiss was a deep, needy tangle and he had Caspian against the tree.

Blood pounding, Peter pulled back just enough to draw air, exertion upon exertion weighing on both of them. He ran his hands down Caspian's sides, over his ribs rising and falling, until they lay heavy at his hips. The hitch in Caspian's breath made Peter look up again. Caspian's smile was shivering with a different sort of anticipation now, and he said, between breaths, "I've never... I haven't... with a man."

Peter skimmed his hand over the front of Caspian's trousers and pressed, shaping his palm and dragging and watching as Caspian hissed in a breath, his eyelids fluttering closed, his back arching just a little up from the treetrunk. For a fleeting moment, Peter hoped that Susan got an opportunity to see this as well, because beauty like this deserved to be appreciated.

Then he stopped thinking of his sister at all, leaned his forehead against the tree with his mouth close to Caspian's ear, and whispered, "There's always a first time."

*

The moon sank below the horizon and the forest grew dark. The stars wheeled and faded. The sky stained slowly towards silver, broken downriver by the delicate plumes that marked the resting places of celebratory fires. Peter sat with his back to the tree and his wrists resting on his raised knees, and let Narnia wake gently around him.

He felt tired, and blessed, and very sore, and at peace.

There was a scuffling behind him, a faint groan, and Peter turned his head to look. Caspian stepped unsteadily up beside him, rubbing at his face and with pine needles in his unruly hair and sticking to his trousers. He glowered down at Peter, and knuckled at one eye. "Have you even slept?"

"Would you believe you snore?"

Caspian snorted. "No." He stretched his arms behind his head, looking askance at the running water. "Did we really swim that?" He chuckled, not waiting for Peter to respond. "We are madmen." Another pause, squinting downriver and then up, and he asked, "How do we get back?"

Peter straightened his legs. "Aslan provides," he said, and grinned up at Caspian. "Or we could always walk down to the ford."


End file.
